The anniversary of the Nakba comes every May. But we, the Palestinians of 1948, live in memory of the Nakba in different circumstances than all other Palestinians. Here from within Israel, we can hear the sirens declare the beginning of the celebration observed by those who occupied us while we are still deeply rooted inside of our homeland. We suffer because we feel alienated in our own country, we shout and scream and no one hears us.
Israel’s Independence Day is marked on May 9 this year, the holiday follows the Hebrew calendar. Israelis celebrate 71 years of independence with picnics, parties, and fireworks. Yet Palestinians, we mourn this day as our Nakba, or catastrophe in Arabic, the start of an ethnic cleaning, the destruction of our villages, and the creation of a refugee population. While international law regards Israel’s occupation of Palestinian lands as only the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, many Palestinian citizens of Israel like myself regard ourselves as also living under occupation. Indeed, at the close of the 1948 war, Palestinian citizens of Israel lived under formal military occupation inside of Israel for two decades.
Israel’s establishment occurred with the destruction of 531 Palestinian villages by Zionist militias and the early Israeli Defense Forces. In the Acre area, 30 villages were destroyed, 64 villages in Ramla district, 31 villages in Bisan, 88 villages near Beer Sheva 88 village, 46 villages in Gaza, 59 by Haifa, 16 in the Hebron are, 25 around Jaffa, 39 near Jerusalem, six by Jenin, five by Nazareth, 78 outside of Safad, 26 by Tiberias, and 18 in the Tulkarem area.
It is understandable then that another anniversary of the Nakba is commemorated as an anniversary of uprooting, displacement, terrorism and ethnic cleansing. It is 71 years of suffering, displacement and in the world and 71 years of international condemnation without a result. The Palestinian people are still one of a few people who lives as refugees in their homeland. There has been 71 years of deprived rights where our land was settled mostly by people who came from all over the world, claiming that Palestine was vacant in the 20th century slogan, “A land without a people for a people without a land.”
In memory of the Nakba …
Israelis celebrate their Independence Day, but it comes with celebrating the suffering of our ancestors, the displacement of our people and the memory of the massacres perpetrated against us over the years.
This victory that is celebrated is at the cost of what the Zionist movement did in what it calls its War of Independence: Zionist militias and later the IDF carried out around 70 massacres, in which around 15 thousands Palestinians were killed, and destroyed some 531 towns. More than 6,000 Israelis were killed in the fighting. In present day, just over the last weekend Israeli forces killed 24 in Gaza, and Palestinians killed 4 Israelis.
To date, all of Israel’s war have created a Palestinians refugee population of 7 million.
Celebrating Israel’s independence means celebrating Palestinians who have been imprisoned. From 1967 to today, the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics reports Israel has at some point detained around one million Palestinians. From 1948 to today, the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics calculates 100,000 Palestinians and other Arabs have been killed in the context of the conflict with Israel, including 20,000 killed in wars in Lebanon.
And, there is no talk of the number of trees that were killed since the Nakba in 1948 until today. The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics estimates around one million trees on lands owned by Palestinians were uprooted since the year 2000.
The memory of the Nakba …
We salute it with our tears and suppress our pains and our sins. We salute it on the same day that Israelis commemorate the establishment of their state. Starting from the ashes of the Nakba to the battle to stay on our land in order to preserve our heritage and identity, and to confront a series of authoritarian and racist laws.
The day of their independence, the day of our Nakba, oh, how hard and deadly are the day. We walk through the streets of our towns and see the new Israeli banners decorated everywhere, on our schools, our streets, on cars and gas stations … we are tired of this life and we are killed everyday, a thousand times as the Israelis wave blue and white flags. When we look at them, they remind us of our martyrs, remind us of our prisoners behind bars.
We commemorate the homes of our destroyed ancestors, we commemorate the Nakba with a march of return and visits to our desolate towns, we send messages of longing to displaced refugees who are waiting to return. We renew their loyalty and visit their destroyed villages. We wander on the soil of our towns and sit on the remaining stones of the rubble of houses that once stood there. We suffer in silence and pride and remain, despite freedom being only a dream.
I would guess 99% of Americans never heard the word Nakba. They would have all heard the word Holocaust. So, now what?
PS, they would not know that the word “genocide” was coined to refer to the Turkish massacre of Armenians. They think the word refers to Jewish deaths.
The caption under the photo says “Palestinians flee from Gaza’s beaches onto boats during the Palestinian nakba, 1949. ”
Beside seeing a rich fat guy with 2 suitcases being carried to a boat while everybody else stays on a beach, Gaza??? 1949???
Was not Gaza occupied by Egypt in 1949? So, is this reason this is being called nakba with a low case letter vs. the other Nakba?
” the IDF carried out around 70 massacres, in which around 15 thousands Palestinians were killed ”
Now you are lying, Dareen. You may want to edit this remark.
First lie.
Between nine and twelve thousand Palestinians died over the course of the War of Independence. That’s about 1% of the population. Around 6,600 Jew died, also about 1% of the Jewish population. So, despite the mass flight of the Arab population, equal proportions of combatants were killed.
Milstein, Uri. ‘History of Israel’s War of Independence’, 4 vols. out of 12 projected, 1996–1999. University Press of America
Second lie.
Civilians die in wartime. One thousand Jewish civilians died BEFORE the Arab States invaded, and some were massacred, like at Gush Etzion and at the Haifa oil refinery. Not all were massacred. Only a small number were massacred. Similarly a small number of Arabs were massacred of the 15,000 you falsely allege.
Dareen. You were educated in Israel and you read and write Hebrew and the accurate figure and sources at within your grasp. You don’t have to lie. BTW, were are your sources regarding 15,000 massacred Arabs? Benny Morris puts the number at 800.
Your provide sources, please, or edit your remarks.
And as a matter of history, how did the Tatour family manage to survive and avoid expulsion?
Here’s a fun fact.
If you’re willing to get your hands dirty and dig, you’ll find that
Dareen’s hometown of Er Reinah, was once an ancient Jewish settlement.
Evidence of a stone-vessel workshop had been found within the precincts of Er-Reinah village for the manufacture of stone vessels which typically appear alongside pottery vessels in the Second Temple period and were used in Jewish settlements.
Stone vessels were used by Jews because stone vessels do not impart ritual impurity.
http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=2061&mag_id=119
bcg
Use your historical knowledge rather than your imagination:
“I can see only three broad outcomes: one state with equal rights, two (real) states, or some sort of apartheid arrangement.”
4. Complete genocide of the Palestinian people in Palestine,
5. Palestine (like, say, ” Algeria” …)
6. Nuclear winter
Your first two, by the way, are not probable at all, while No. 6 is slightly less improbable than those. As for No. 3, it is already the officially established situation (and not an “outcome” any longer, ie since the first day of the Zionist state entity.)
“the expansion of the settlements and continuous drip of ethnic cleansing has pretty much indicated what the Israeli government wants”
Correct. It has indicated, stated, theorized, published and announced many times that it wants the total disappearance of the Palestinian people and even their memory. Nothing less.